WMDs and Bush - Lie or mistake?

[West]

This Modern World

This Modern World

hey moron,
walk away from the X-box. Even though Hi Tech is great, we cant see through clouds, rock, mountains, or even most thin metal roofs like most warehouses have. Turn off Sci-Fi channel, and read a newspaper.(preferably not the NY times)
P.S. Remember the lines of trucks enroute to Syria in the 3 weeks leading up to the war, what were they carrying??? oh yeah, X-boxes....

[Cyrus]

[ QUOTE ]
If you're clean, why act like you're trying to hide something?

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The secretive nature of all dictatorships is a factor. Especially dictatorships on a war footing, which has been on, moreover, for decades.

Plus, the fact that Saddam Hussein did not want Iraq to appear militarily weaker, especially towards Israel and Iran, its arch-enemies. Beyond that, the stalling was a standard netotiating ploy towards placating the western demands by slowly feeding them with compliance.

This case (why Saddam's Iraq did not open everything to inspection) has been examined and analyzed already. Western intelligence was perfectly aware of the ways of Saddam's Iraq.

[John Cole]

Iraq delivers a 1400 page report detailing the elimination of WMDs--in Farsi. Question: How long did the US wait before denouncing the report as a pack of lies?

Joe Wilson anyone?

Our intelligence shows that WMDs are being moved before UN inspectors show up for inspections.

[MMMMMM]

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Iraq delivers a 1400 page report detailing the elimination of WMDs--in Farsi. Question: How long did the US wait before denouncing the report as a pack of lies?

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It seems you are questioning the ability of the USA to so quickly determine what the submitted report contained. I'll get to that in a moment, but first, here is my recollection of events:

The objection of the U.S. was that the report contained nothing new (not that it was a pack of lies); that it was merely a massive resubmission of documents detailing the already known and previously documented destruction of certain WMD's (actually, most of Iraq's WMDs).

The key element being requested of Iraq was documentation of certain WMDs which had been known to exist but of which their destruction remained unverified.

Under U.N. auspices and observation, Iraq had destroyed large quantities of WMDs. Saddam also later claimed to have unilaterally destroyed the remaining WMDs without U.N. observation, but he offered no substantiation for those acts other than his own word.

The U.S. was objecting that the 1400 page document detailed the destruction only of the former, not the latter.

The Baathist cronies under Saddam's rule were supreme archivists, keeping written records on nearly everything of importance that ever transpired, right down to the names of, and methods of torture and execution used upon, suspected political opponents; their physical and dental conditions, and much more. A large prison contained such detailed archives on all of its inmates. The regime appears to have archived other types of security-related matters in similarly ultra-painstaking fashion.

It would be very odd and out-of-character for the regime to have not meticulously archived the purported unilateral destruction of the WMDs in question. However, they submitted nothing regarding such events in their latest compiled report. And they KNEW that presentation of at least SOME substantiating evidence of the claimed unilateral destructions was the very reason the report was being asked of them in the first place.

Since the submitted report only dealt with already known information, the U.S. denounced it as "nothing new" and a stalling tactic.

Now, how could the U.S. have determined what was in the lengthy report, written in a foreign language, so quickly? My guess is that the entire document was not translated, but rather headings and sub-headings, dates and so forth, were translated and outlined to see what was and was not covered. If all the dates and headings/sub-headings were merely duplicates of already known and reported events, then it is not hard to imagine how the U.S. could so quickly have known that it was all old material.

I do agree the timing looks questionable, but my opinion is that it is not nearly so far-fetched as you seem to believe. Actually, I would guess that the likely answer is just as outlined above.

[andyfox]

The fact is that key members of the administration, including Cheney, Runsfeld, and Wolfowitz, had called for a change of regime in Iraq in 1992. So when they got into power, it was a foregone conclusion that Hussein would be gotten rid of. He had outlived his usefulness.

There was nothing that could have been in the report that would have changed things. The administration had already made up its mind. This is clear and incontestable. One can agree that it was the right thing to do; or think that it was wrong. There is, IMHO, a case that can be made for getting rid of Hussein for humanitarian reasons. What can't be done is to deny that the die was cast before 9/11. Afer 9/11, the administration did everything it could to link Hussein with 9/11 and to try to get the public to see things in the prism of Husseinaphobia.

I'm amazed when people deny that there could have been lying or manipulation of facts. It's like in Casablanca when Claude Raines shuts down Sam's place because he's "shocked, SHOCKED," to find out there was gambling going on. And right after he says that, they bring him his winnings, for which he says, "thank you." I'd be shocked if someone can cite any war we've fought in, or, for that matter, any war any country has fought it, that the leaders didn't lie or fudge about.

It didn't matter what was in those 1400 pages, the administration was going to reject it, period.

[John Cole]

M, I'll agree that "pack of lies" smacks of rank hyperbole; however, it took less than a day, I believe, for the report to be denounced. As a sort of analogy: one company markets a software program that will read and grade student essays. In fact, it does so too quickly, so the designers built in a delay to keep students from becoming suspicious. Perhaps we may have waited a week or so.

As far as "stalling tactic" goes, yes, I can see where that would be of utmost concern. After all, we were in "imminent danger."

When asked what the public's opnion was of a certain issue was, George Bush the First, replied, "I don't know; we haven't had time to create it yet." The son seems to have learned something from the father.

[MMMMMM]

Andy, I agree that the die was probably cast aforehand, and that it might not have much mattered what was in those reports.

My overall take of the grander picture is twofold:

1) that the U.S. government employed a fair bit of "spin" in making the case for invasion, yet probably without actually engaging in substantial lying or the fabricating of evidence

2) that Saddam obfuscated, delayed, cheated, denied, kicked and screamed, dug in his heels for many years, all the while being as obstreporous as possible--as he systematically went about torturing, maiming, raping, killing, and generally doing great evils to the Iraqi populace on grand scale. So, if he got a bit of short shrift at the end, well, I'll just have to say, better late than never.

This is one case where I think the the removal of the regime would justify more even than mere spin. My empathies are with the long-brutalized Iraqi people, and I think that their fate and future matters far more than whether or not we are above employing a bit of spin on the public stage.

[MMMMMM]

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As far as "stalling tactic" goes, yes, I can see where that would be of utmost concern. After all, we were in "imminent danger."

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Well it turns out we weren't in imminent danger--although I thought the administration's line was that of precluding the advent of imminent danger, not that it was already upon us.

At any rate, over a decade of stalling was too long, and Saddam's regime was severely brutalizing the Iraqi people on grand scale all the while--please see my response to Andy for more of my take on this aspect.

[ QUOTE ]
When asked what the public's opnion was of a certain issue was, George Bush the First, replied, "I don't know; we haven't had time to create it yet." The son seems to have learned something from the father.

[/ QUOTE ]

Reading this, I had a related glimmer of what one difference between our respective takes on the overall picture might be: you and Andy seem immensely concerned with the propriety of our own conduct, whereas I feel the plight of the brutalized and tyrannized should take precedence in evaluating things.

That's perhaps a crude way of putting it and not exactly what I am trying to say, but I'm not finding the exact words at the moment. I certainly don't intend it as casting aspersion on your degree of empathy for the Iraqis. I'm just observing that we seem to weigh these things differently somehow. As far as I'm concerned, Bush could lie, saying the moon was made of green cheese, if it would also mean that a terrible tyrant would be deposed and an entire people potentially liberated.

In my view there is nothing on the Earth more evil, and more harmful to the human spirit and psyche, or more of a bane to human existence; than vast and brutal tyranny. Lying, certainly, is far less evil. Also, as in my post to Andy, I don't think the administration so much lied as employed a healthy (or perhaps unhealthy) dose of spin.

Just some things to consider. I doubt if we'll ever see completely eye to eye on this, but if my guess is right--that you and Andy weight the above-mentioned things somehow differently than I do--then that might explain much of why we differ on this matter.

[nicky g]

"Also there is a strong feeling by many out there that Syria may have been the beneficiary of WMD largesse from Saddam.
"

There is a strong feeling by many out there that Elvis is still alive. It would really depress me if you really belive this is a likely explanation for what happened.